We propose to analyze recent changes in the situation of young women in the United States. The basic questions which this study will investigate are: (1) In what way does the current "situation" of young American women differ from what it was ten or fifteen years ago; and (2) How are changes in the various life cycle processes in which young adults participate interrelated with one another and how are these interrelationships changing. This project focuses on two separate population groups: (1) women under the age of 25, who are in the process of completing their education, marrying, establishing separate households, and beginning their fertility; (2) young married couples within the first few years of marriage as they are establishing households and careers, beginning childbearing, changing residence and jobs at high intensity. A variety of data sources will be used including decennial Censuses, Current Population Surveys, National Fertility Study and its predecessors and successor, and various consumption and expenditure data sets. The general outline of trends in fertility, employment, marriage, marital disruption, consumption, etc. are fairly well-known. This project will improve our knowledge and understanding of them by: (1) focusing attention on the experience of young women; (2) disaggregating trends to a greater degree than heretofore has been done; (3) relating these life cycle processes to one another; (4) updating many aggregate time series to the very recent past; (5) utilizing a wide variety of secondary data sources; (6) focusing on economic rewards as well as economic activities of women.